Representatives from four daily newspapers and two radio stations waited for Dion Phaneuf. Three television cameras had also staked out territory a few feet from his dressing room stall, and when the Toronto Maple Leafs captain finally arrived Thursday afternoon, a fourth camera rushed across the floor to join the mob.

The lights went up, the questions started rolling.

A day earlier, Sports Illustrated released the results of a survey in which 161 of Phaneuf’s peers labelled him the National Hockey League’s most overrated player, for the second year in a row. In Toronto, the results of the survey had become kind of a big deal.

And those words, from that stall, could spread quickly across the league. If teams deep in the United States want NHL news, they usually need to tune their televisions to Canadian stations — it is not uncommon to see TSN or Sportsnet flickering in a home team’s room in the U.S. — which might explain part of Phaneuf’s problem.

Related

Phaneuf is captain of the most popular team in the most populous city in what is the most hockey-crazed country on earth. No member of the Leafs ever really goes unheralded, so it stands to reason that the captain might be a little overexposed to the liking of his rivals.

And there are other reasons, too.

“Obviously, he’s not a guy that is too well liked,” Leafs forward Joffrey Lupul said. “If you watch the games, I mean, he’s always mixing it up after the whistles and kind of irritating the opposition. So it’s not really that surprising. I think when guys get asked that question, they’re more so answering it on who they would least like to play against.”

Teammate Mike Komisarek also made the list, placing No. 10 on the list of 15 players.

“I saw the list of 15 guys, and I’d take every one on my team,” Leafs coach Ron Wilson said. “I think most people would. So that’s a poll that people do every once in a while to get a reaction or to sell a magazine or whatever. But I don’t think any of the players take that seriously, and I certainly don’t.”

Komisarek only fielded two questions on the subject before declaring he would field no more. Phaneuf, rigid and stone-faced at the best of times, fielded several with a variation of the same answer. If the survey ate at either of them, it was tough to judge.

The Leafs acquired Phaneuf in a trade with the Calgary Flames two years ago this month and named him captain that summer. Toronto missed the playoffs in his first season, and it missed again last season, after a serious gash in his leg forced Phaneuf from active duty for almost the entire month of November.

It took him a while to regain his stride. The weight of his contact (which carries a cap hit of US$6.5-million a season through 2013-14), combined with his standing as captain of a struggling team in Toronto, did not exactly spare him from criticism at the time.

If anyone was overrating him, they did so quietly.

Phaneuf began drawing praise for his play early this season, and has hit the midpoint with an average of more than 25 minutes of ice time a game, among the top 15 defencemen in the league. He has retained a level of physical play, but not so much that it takes him out of position, as it might have earlier in his career.

“He’s had a great year, and for people to say he’s overrated right now, I don’t know why he’s even mentioned in that sentence,” Leafs defenceman Luke Schenn said. “I think he’s proving right now he’s one of the top defencemen in the league. He’s putting up points, he’s playing against other teams’ top lines.”

Komisarek, meanwhile, is still in the early stages of returning from a broken arm suffered in November. Like Phaneuf, Komisarek also has a substantial contract that carries with it the weight of expectation, but unlike the captain, he tried to make light of the survey.

He pointed to the results of a list published months earlier, when he ranked in the top five behind David Beckham, NFL veteran Jason Taylor and tennis star Andy Roddick. The list — “5 Male Athletes We Love to Watch” — was published by Shape magazine and said of Komisarek: “Even in all that padding, USA Olympic Men’s Ice Hockey player Komisarek is too cute for words!”

“I guess it’s a good thing my fiancée subscribes to Shape magazine instead of SI,” he said with a smile on Thursday. “She wouldn’t marry me.”